The Lost Castle

by Nick Cole

  This eye thing was freaking him out. Like the culmination of everything that had happened and couldn’t be understood. It was as if one’s mind could only take so much departure from reality. So much wrong. So much weird before the mind just snapped and you began to run, mindlessly. Fleeing without reason. Without mind. Just running.

  Because to stay...

  ... because to stay was unthinkable.

  ... unfathomable.

  ... death.

  ... Like that other fate in the Well of Nothingness.

  He made it to a small door in the vast wall ahead. There was a handle, and as soon as he put his hands on it, the eye frog-croaked again and some alarm that was odd and out of place began to bleat in a steady electronic monotone. Like some robot DJ summoning dancers to the dance floor.

  Like it was an alarm humans were never meant to hear.

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Thirty-six hours from now, back in 1977, from this moment on the way to the airport, everything will change. But Frank in 1977 doesn’t know that. Doesn’t know the world will be overrun by the dead and he’ll be fighting not just for his life, but the lives of his friends atop the gate made of shipping containers. In 1977, Frank doesn’t know that thirty-six hours later... everything will change. Just like it changed in Barcelona before the hit on the Spanish bureaucrat who was running agents of the Black Hand across the straits and into Africa. Something big was going down in Africa. Some kind of bioweapon attack. But everything had dried up there by seventy-seven. The project had disappeared and the hit teams from the Order had all gone missing.

  And despite the unspoken accusation, Andrea who might make a whore of his daughter, would not send her there. Not her team.

  Not the parents of his granddaughter Maria. As though he knew that nothing but death and darkness awaited the Order in Africa.

  Thirty-six hours before everything changed, Frank and Jordana are in the backseat of a yellow taxi, threading a press of well-dressed men and women at La Guardia. Pulling out Samsonite luggage as a light rain and gray dirty skies hover over umbrellas and worsted wool suits. The women in pillbox hats and gloves. The big blue stripe and gleaming metal bellied Pan Am 747 looming just beyond the curve of the fantastic terminal of the future way back when.

  Flight 408 for Bangkok.

  Follow Professor Harding Ravenhill. Find out who he meets and follow them. Those were the orders. Ravenhill had been doing a lot of off-book research when he wasn’t teaching at Oxford. Research he wasn’t getting paid for. At least not paid where anyone could see. And researching genetic mutations was something that required money. So who was paying, and more importantly, where was the research going? Those things needed to be found out and then Ravenhill needed to be dead.

  This wasn’t bad, thought Frank as the cab edged closer to the curb and the skycaps waited to take their bags. The warmth of the cab and the rain on the windows was nice. Frank thought of Marie, tearing his focus away from Ravenhill who had a first class ticket on flight 408. There was a smile on his face.

  Just thinking about his daughter. About the beautiful little curly-haired girl he and Jordana have made.

  “I know,” says Jordana and squeezes his arm. “Me too.”

  Jordana is dressed as a flight attendant. Sky blue uniform. Gloves. Pillbox hat.

  When they are gone, away from Marie, killing very bad people in Macau, London, Lisbon, Rio De Janeiro, Bermuda, Tehran and all the other places they’ve been sent, Marie stays with Andrea and the housekeeper Mrs. Concetti back on the hidden island somewhere in the Mediterranean. She stays there when her parents are saving the world from a new apocalypse one terrible moment at a time. Death, destruction, and darkness if they don’t.

  When they are home it is the opposite of that. It is waffles in the morning and a swim at the tiny quiet beach on the other side of the island beneath the wall of the castle. It is a long lunch in town. And a nap in the afternoon with her between them.

  It is life.

  It is the opposite of all the world.

  That moment. That moment that made Frank smile in the cab in the rain on the way to murder someone to save someone else. A whole bunch of someone elses. Maybe even the world. Frank was thinking of their last afternoon on the island. Of watching Marie by the seashore with a tiny pail and shovel. She would chase the waves out, waving her shovel at them, and run in screaming and laughing when they came back for her. Just tiny waves and tiny legs running back and forth, her shovel like the sword of some ancient Spartan, flashing back and forth as she ran in the sparkle of sea and sun.

  And later, in the cool of their room in Jordana’s apartment that was now theirs, each of them burnt by the sun, smelling of salt and sea, lying in bed listening to the fan above stir the gentle afternoon. Gently moving round and round above. He’d looked over and watched Jordana watching Marie. Who was watching him.

  Then Marie said, “I’m happy, Daddy.”

  And they’d slept and Frank couldn’t tell what was real and what was a dream. This life, here on the island, this really was the over the rainbow he’d been singing softly to Marie since he first held her.

  Was it a dream, or was it real?

  “She’ll be fine,” whispered Jordana as the cab pulled to a stop alongside the curb and the cabbie switched the flag over the fare.

  “I know,” said Frank.

  And then he’d put those thoughts away. They would find Ravenhill in the Pan Am executive lounge. And then they would follow him, find out what he was up to, and kill everyone involved.

  An hour later in the boarding lounge Frank puts eyes on target. Ravenhill is sitting in a deep cushioned blue chair, nursing a premium scotch on the rocks and reading a boating magazine. Not just a boating magazine. A yachting magazine. Really, a catalog for people who want to buy big expensive boats.

  That, thinks Frank, is a man who’s about to come into a lot of money. Very soon, in fact. Frank drank a tomato juice and watched another big 747 taxi beyond the one in front of the massive window. The one they’d spend the next twenty-three hours on en route to Bangkok.

  Why Bangkok, wondered Frank. Why Bangkok?

  An hour later, Frank is following the man, three passengers back. The narrow jetway opens into the first class section. Dr. Ravenhill smiles as the pretty stewardess, Jordana, nods at his ticket, and with one gloved hand directs the spindly doctor toward the front of the aircraft, away from the cold and rain and smell of jet fuel. Toward the warmth and luxury of Ambassador Class.

  Frank is holding a business class ticket. With the barest of smiles, she takes his ticket and repeats the seat number, handing it back to him. He feels one slender index finger caress his palm. And it still feels like live electricity loose on his skin.

  He barely acknowledges her and heads toward his seat just a few rows behind the curtain that will soon separate the two classes.

  The massive plane pushes back from the gate twenty minutes later, and Frank is only pretending to listen to the inflight music program. In actuality he’s hearing everything Jordana’s lapel mic is picking up.

  “Can I offer you a champagne before takeoff, Mr. Ravenhill?”

  “Doctor, and oh I shouldn’t... but, why not?” A creepy chuckle.

  Frank notices the girl, the woman, in the short trench coat, long legs and high heels, take a seat just behind the curtain. She’s Eurasian. A wide-brimmed hat. A silk short mini dress revealing dangerous curves and an athletic body. Long straight dark hair casts itself along one shoulder. It’s when she sits down, flicks open a large magazine she’s not reading because she’s too busy looking into first class, that Frank spots the tiny Black Hand on the inside of her palm. Hiding between thumb and forefinger. She only barely nods at the massive gorilla with the broken nose that squeezes, barely, along the aisle past Frank and off to the seats further back in the massive jetliner.

 
When Frank gets his first scotch, he pulls out a fountain pen that’s also a scalpel and filled with deadly poison in a tiny reservoir that emits from the tip when the top of the pen is pushed upon hard enough. Hard enough to jab into someone’s neck. Besides all that, he can write with it too.

  Using a quick code, Frank jots a note for Jordana who checks the cabin every twenty minutes, always casually gazing past Frank, waiting for a sign.

  He nods and she feigns taking a drink order and picking up plastic cups filled with the watery remains of others. Frank barely shifts the napkin to the side of the tray without even acknowledging her.

  Danger. 2.

  8A.

  ? to the Rear. Big Guy. Broken Nose.

  Jordana reads the note in the flight attendants’ service area and immediately sends it into the tiny trash container.

  She knows the Black Hand is onboard. The meeting isn’t in Thailand. The meeting’s here. Now. On this flight.

  She adjusts her pillbox flight attendant’s hat, checking her piled hair and the two pearl-studded, poison hairpins adorning it. She straightens her outfit and nods pleasantly to another flight attendant who enters the galley.

  The woman begins to chat about something as she bends down. Her smock slips, causing the neck of her dress to gape open on one side. On her shoulder is a tiny, badly done Black Hand.

  Chapter Forty

  As the massive truck was being backed into position, Steele came back over the net at Braddock.

  “Paladin, you are compromising mission integrity. Rejoin the convoy immediately if you want to survive. Now.”

  “Negative, Warlord. We are not leaving these people. Either we take them with us, or help them get clear of the area. We will not continue the mission until we assist.”

  Silence.

  Braddock watched the other Humvees come to a halt farther down the length of the darkened mall.

  On the other side of the MRAP, the dead, just a few at first, began to beat at the side of the giant vehicle blocking the smashed entrance. The mall survivors pushed makeshift debris around the edges of the gaps. Beyond the dead, uncountable more dead were filling the wide and once vacant parking lot where shoppers had come in droves to find every bargain imaginable.

  Steele came walking out of the shadows further down the mall. He was carrying the big Mossberg tactical shotgun, and Braddock remembered how he’d used it on the last guy who’d disobeyed one of Steele’s orders.

  Draw now and go for it, urged some voice deep within Braddock. Right here. Right now. Best chance you’ll ever get. Maybe the only one. Maybe the last one.

  “Sky’s startin’ to get dark again,” warned Brees. “Just like it did back at the El Cajon Pass before the...” Braddock looked up at the overhead atrium and saw that the natural light was once again roiling with dark masses just as it had before they’d hidden in the warehouse. Just before the trap.

  Dark blurs seemed to dart from cloudburst to cloudburst.

  The Ancient Hunter.

  And..

  The Sisters.

  And...

  Whatever it takes.

  Braddock turned toward Steele in one swift motion, ready to draw and fire.

  Except the big man already had his shotgun leveled at Braddock’s midsection.

  Boom, thought Braddock. I’m dead.

  “Get back in your MRAP,” ordered Steele without any tone in his voice other than the dead flat delivery he always used. “We need every available asset to reach the objective, Captain. Taking civilians will only decrease our odds of survival.”

  Braddock reached... for his canteen.

  Unscrewed it.

  Drank.

  Waiting for the blast that would end all of this. Whatever “this” was.

  When it didn’t happen, he screwed the cap back on and looked straight at Steele.

  “Imagine what the odds will be all by yourself.”

  Not an ounce of movement. Not a tic. Not a tell. Not even a facial muscle clenching in some kind of determined yet restrained rage.

  Braddock continued.

  “We need to secure these people, Steele. That’s what we do. What we did. Once. We’re humans. You don’t want that... fine. Take whoever will go with you and try to make it through that toll road on your own. My guess... you’ll need every gun blazing. And right now... you’ve got one less.”

  Silence.

  Braddock waited.

  Everybody watched.

  “Our odds are...” began Steele like some child who wouldn’t have the facts interfering with his narrative.

  “I know that,” interrupted Braddock, low and deadly. “But this is the way it has to be. You want me? You take them.” Braddock indicated the survivors milling about in the shadows.

  Steele watched him. Braddock could feel the full weight of the massive computer Steele called a brain. As though thought was merely crunching data behind the mirrored sunglasses. The giant in front of him... who wasn’t really a man. He was a monster, like a shark, watching him, and adding things up. Scanning him. Smelling for blood in the water.

  What is he? wondered Braddock. What is he really?

  Some massive dark shadow blurred across the wan light coming through the skylights of the mall high above. Then it was gone.

  “We can either defend this mall...”

  “They’re here,” interrupted Steele, looking skyward. Braddock was sure the giant man was somehow tracking the shadowy blurs in the darkness of what should have been a blazing endless noonday sky. “Load the civilians into the vehicles. We’ve got to move. Now.”

  Steele was off and heading back toward the lead Humvee.

  Braddock turned to the woman with the gun.

  The forest of fists was rising as more and more zekes pushed at the far side of the MRAP. Pounding against the side of the vehicle as though they knew if they kept that up, they could smash everything. Even the world.

  “Get your people into any vehicle they can squeeze into. We’re getting out of here. Now!”

  “Out... of... here...” she mumbled slowly. Then mouthed the words again without sound.

  “Do you realize what you’ve done!” she shrieked suddenly. “You’ve killed us all!” she screamed. “We were safe here. All we had to do was be quiet and they’d leave us alone. Now...” her eyes were wild and rolling, weeks’ worth of tension surfacing into a hysterical rant. Her mouth contorted between a cry and a sneer. Braddock could see she had once been a beautiful woman. As little as two weeks ago. Before all this. The type that had a personal trainer and drove a brand new BMW to her executive job.

  Braddock slapped her.

  “Get...” he was low and close. In her face. “into the vehicles. Now! Stay here... you’re dead.”

  Within two minutes the people, some screaming, some crying, were being loaded into the convoy vehicles. Crawling in where they could. Jamming in among the weapons, explosives, and mercenaries.

  Braddock did one last check of the convoy and gave the hand signal to move out. Hearing her words again and again.

  “You’ve killed us all.”

  Probably, he thought.

  The convoy started off, slowly threading the darkness of the mall. Headlights played out against sudden scenes of normalcy amidst the shadowy blue gloom of the inner recesses deep within the mall.

  Braddock told Gautreaux to wait, giving the convoy time to get father down into the mall.

  “Brees, you keep up the fire until we get out of here. Use it all if you have to. Keep ‘em off the convoy.”

  “Copy that, Cap.”

  The woman, the children, and some others who’d squeezed in with them stared in horror and amazement. Silently knowing this was where the journey got weird. Where one departed the barricaded known for the dangerous and exposed unknown.

  Th
e monster military vehicle pulled itself away from the makeshift barrier as debris and zekes spilled inward. Mindless. Starving. Murderous.

  The minigun opened up, spilling hot brass shells everywhere, raking the crowd of undead pushing inward from the shadowy daylight beyond the ragged tear in the cemetery of commerce that was once a mall. Stumbling forward only to be cut to pieces along the arcade of silent shops that would never sell again. Marketing posters and smiling cutouts watched all the carnage and insanity without comment. Cell phones and pretzels were still for sale. Beautiful models urged the survivors and zekes to enjoy these things. Or so the advertisements would promise until it all burned, or faded into meaninglessness.

  “Keep it slow, Gautreaux,” warned Braddock. “Gotta keep them off the main body until the convoy clears the mall.”

  Zekes came in ragged waves, following and falling, chasing and being disintegrated beneath Brees’ automated blur of leaded mayhem.

  In the side mirror, Braddock could see surging zekes being pulverized by the lead-storm of the gun. And still, they came on, never minding. As though it were the ultimate offensive line and its depth was unknowable. Relentless. Tireless.

  The big MRAP turned on to the main concourse of the mall, crushing kiosks and sending scattered goods in every direction. Zekes were now overtaking the MRAP, runners running, their hoary faces masks of desperate anger. Their jaws worked tirelessly as though they were already at table. These were the new kind. The kind that had only recently appeared. The fast movers.

  Were they evolving, wondered Braddock, studying their faces beyond the thick safety glass of the passenger window.

  Ahead, one of the Humvees was swarmed. Zekes were crawling in through every smashed window. The gunner was gone. Braddock scanned the shadowy mall. A wide concourse like a dry riverbed was filling with more zekes from other entrances. Coming out from every direction within the mall as though the barricades were gone now.

  Or removed?

  The gunners from each Humvee were shooting wildly, laying waste to scores of the dead in every direction as hundreds more took their place like raving addicts of some new terrible drug that just had to be obeyed.